Below are some examples of activities in the Borough that residents can undertake to help improve their health and wellbeing.
Keeping fit and active
There are 5 leisure centres in the Wokingham Borough and the Council offers a discount leisure card to the local residents. In addition, there are over a hundred of different clubs and leisure activities including health walks, cycling and sailing.
Wokingham Borough Council runs several programmes of physical activities for adults and children. Wokingham Active Kids is run during holidays and includes a wide range of activities such as football, swimming, dancing, tennis, cricket, judo and basketball. SHINE is a programme of physical activities for people 50+ offering 54 different classes per week such as line dancing, seated Zumba and swimming. SHINE has around 1,500 members. SHINE+ offers physical activities for people with disabilities, mental health problems and carers.
Wokingham Borough residents have easy access to leisure, sports and art venues both within the borough, but also in surrounding towns such as Reading, Henley, Bracknell and Windsor.
Health services
There is a wide range of specialist health services in West Berkshire including specialist services such as support for looked after children and a prison health service. There are 13 GP surgeries and an out of hours service (NHS 111).
Employment
The Borough has a strong regional economy dominated by the IT, communications and pharmaceutical sectors and has excellent communication links to London, Heathrow and the motorway network. According the Office for National Statistic, in 2012-2013 unemployment fell by 12% in comparison to the previous year (measured in the number of Job Seeker’s Allowance claimants).
Housing
There is a wide range of housing options in Wokingham Borough. Around 100-150 affordable homes are delivered in Wokingham Borough each year. The most common type of housing in Wokingham Borough is detached housing, followed by semi-detached housing. There is more housing that are caravans or mobile structure in the Wokingham Borough as a proportion of all housing types than there is nationally and across the South East. For more information please refer to the Housing and Homelessness section.